CoronationIsland is the largest island; its highest point is Mount Nivea and rises to 1266 (The 13th letter of the Roman alphabet) m above sea level.

The Inaccessible Islands about 15 (A state in southwestern United States on the Mexican border) nm to the west are also considered part of the SouthOrkneys.

The SouthOrkneyIslands were discovered in 1821 by two sealers: the (A native or inhabitant of the United States) American (Click link for more info and facts about Nathaniel Brown Palmer) Nathaniel Brown Palmer and the (The people of Great Britain) British George Powell.

Lynch Island (latitude 60°39'10" S, longitude 45°36'25" W; area: 0.1 km2) is a small island situated at the eastern end of Marshall Bay in the SouthOrkneyIslands, about 200 msouth of CoronationIsland and 2.4 km north of Signy Island (Map 1).

The island is exposed to the south-west and to katabatic and föhn winds descending from CoronationIsland to the north.

Elsewhere on the island, the grass and, to a lesser extent, the pearlwort are frequent associates in other communities, especially stands of denser fellfield vegetation where there is quite high cover afforded by various mosses and lichens (particularly towards the western end of the northern terrace).

CoronationIsland and Laurie Island are the two largest islands of several islands comprising the SouthOrkneyIslands group.

Laurie Island is the smaller of the two, only about 20 km long, and comprises a number of precipitous ridges radiating from a central mountainous spine.

In the spring it would be necessary for Scotia to return to the Falkland Islands for a refit, stores and spares, and thus accommodation ashore would be required for continuing the meteorological observations started on leaving the Falkland Islands.

www.collectorstarget.com /bat0204.html (2298 words)

South Orkney Islands on Encyclopedia.com(Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-06)

Discovered in 1821, they were claimed by the British and are included as dependencies of the colony of the Falkland Islands.

The Argentine government, which also claims them, maintains meteorological and wireless stations on Laurie Island.

Geographic translocation of bats: known and potential problems.

www.encyclopedia.com /html/S/SthO1rk.asp (216 words)

List of Protected Areas proposed by the UK(Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-06)

Designated on the grounds that the vegetation on Green Island is exceptionally rich, with well-developed continuous banks of moss turf (which over much of their extent overlie peat more than 1 m deep) and small patches of Antarctic hair grass.

The area includes all of Powell Islandsouth of the latitude of the southern summit of John Peaks, together with the whole of Fredriksen Island, Michelsen Island, Christoffersen Island, Grey Island and adjacent unnamed islands.

Designation on the grounds that southern Powell Island and the adjacent islands support flora and a considerable bird and mammal fauna, which is representative of the natural ecology of the SouthOrkneyIslands, and which are rendered more important by the presence of a small, long-established breeding colony of fur seals.

Several Antarcticisland groups are considered part of the Antarctica ecozone, including South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, SouthOrkneyIslands, the South Shetland Islands, Bouvet Island, the Crozet Islands, Prince Edward Islands, Heard Island, the Kerguelen Islands, and the McDonald Islands.

These islands have a somewhat milder climate than Antarctica proper, and support a greater diversity of tundra plants, although they are all too windy and cold to support trees.

In addition, large numbers of striated caracaras, one of the rarest bird of prey species in the world, nest on this island, which is also host to large communities of elephant seals, sea lions, and 47 species of birds.

The island is also home to a colony of more than 75,000 king penguins; South Georgia is one of the few places on Earth where king penguins exist.

The mountainous SouthOrkneys are some of the most remote islands on Earth; in the winter they are actually joined to the Antarctic Peninsula, 450 miles away, by a solid sheet of fast ice.

Many of the peri-Antarctic islands were discovered by sealers or whalers and the first landings on half of them were made by men engaged in the whale and penguin oil industry.

A particular problem with many sealing voyages was the secrecy with which the industry was conducted; should a captain and crew discover a new sealing area, they normally concealed its location in the hope of having no competition when exploiting it on subsequent voyages.

The first American casualties in Antarctica came in a tragic PBM Mariner "flying boat" crash on Thurston Island, southwest of Peter I Island, during this expedition.

Moving across the ocean once more towards the west-south-west, this small island was originally covered in dense forest, but it is believed that volcanic gas from beneath the island killed all the plant life.

This island, lying just to the west of the last, was made famous by a UFO sighting in 1958 from an American Navy ship.

The island was named by a Scottish seal hunter, and is now divided between the UK and Argentina who both have scientific teams there.

Antarctic Alert - Full Record Display(Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-06)

The oceanic islands in the Southern Ocean can be considered amongst the remotest shores as, not only are they uninhabited (except for small research stations) and geographically isolated, but they are also enclosed by the oceanographic barrier of the Polar Frontal Zone.

We survey island shores in the Scotia Arc mountain chain linking Antarctica to South America, including South Georgia, the South Sandwich archipelago and Adelaide Island off the west coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, and compare our findings to literature reports from two other Scotia Arc island groups (SouthOrkney and South Shetland archipelagos).

The presence of marine pollution (in the form of beached debris) in this region is significant, both as a measure of man's influence on this isolated environment, and due to direct dangers posed to the fauna.

usgspubs.georef.org /A_A_O013.htm (229 words)

Sledging in the South Orkney Islands, 1902-04(Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-06)

While the 1902-1904 Scottish National Antarctic Expedition was based on Laurie Island in the SouthOrkneyIslands, the opportunity was taken to make an accurate topographical survey of the island, as existing maps had proved to be wildly inaccurate.

The steep icy nature of the terrain made overland travel almost impossible, so most journeys were undertaken from the sea or from the frozen pack-ice round the coast.

This photograph illustrates some of the dogs assisting with the sledge-hauling for which they were intended.